As requested by city leaders, Baldwin citizens showed up Tuesday evening for the city’s budget town hall meeting. The meeting was scheduled to be held in the community room in city hall. So many residents showed up, the crowd exceeded the allowable occupancy for the room. Mayor Stephanie Almagno was advised by the Code Compliance officer and Fire Chief the meeting would have to be moved, resulting in the meeting being moved outside.
With chairs in hand, approximately 80 people moved to the parking lot at the rear of the building.
The meeting was not held to discuss the budget specifically, but rather, how to pay for it. After the most recent round of cuts, the city is facing a budget deficit of $891,615.
Almagno told the attendees that the meeting’s purpose was to discuss services, specifically how many services residents want, at what level they want those services, and the impacts of cuts or decreases to city services.
One service that numerous citizens discussed more than others was the fire service. Many agreed that the service is expensive and the city should explore consolidating with another fire department. One person suggested developing a co-op for the fire service with Cornelia that could result in shared costs between the two cities.
It was also suggested that the city consider consolidating its police department. However, Chief Chris Jones told the audience that code compliance citations and city ordinance violations could not be heard in state court, only in municipal court. Code compliance was a service discussed at a similar town hall meeting held at Life Church four years ago.
After nearly two hours of discussion, there was no definitive plan for what services would be cut or decreased, nor was there a clear plan for how to pay for the budget deficit.
Over the coming weeks, the city council will hold several budget hearings to seek further input from residents.
